Found some figures for Iraqi defence expenditure.

2012 allocation was $17.1 billion out of an overall approved national budget of $100 billion.

The majority of the 70% increase compared to 2011 was earmarked for procurement and I don’t think it is an ongoing increase.

Also from what I can tell the defence budget has to cover Ministry of Interior expenditure as well, at about $6 billion per year.

So say $5 billion remaining for the forces puts Iraq on par with post-austerity Greece, Indonesia and Mexico. About twice that of Kuwait and one-seventh of Saudi.

And a little more info. The APX-6B was the IFF transmitter and the APA-89 was the back-end coded signal generator for it, according to this F-8 manual. Standard US Navy pairing it seems.

? Or to narrow it down, does anyone know which company made the radios for the Sikorsky S-61, when the type first entered service? Thank you.

Here’s what I have from the Aircraft Characteristics for both the HSS-2 in 1961 and the re-designated SH-3A in 1967 ( no change in that period it seems ).

The mysterious ARN-21A ‘radio set’ is actually a TACAN.

the iraqi AF and army aviation has in place maintenance and support contracts with all its new suppliers. But they are at the same time building up their new capabilities very quickly through training of hundreds of engineers, technicians and field staff in Iraq and abroad. Some of these are veterans from the 1980s-90s, and others are new graduates.

That is good news, but classroom training doesn’t address the key problems of understanding how systems integrate on modern aircraft. That has to be learned gradually, building a corpus of practical knowledge.

A good example would be the trials and tribulations encountered by Poland when introducing the F-16, and that was for a force with a strong independent technical base.

As for Iraqi airways: same problem in my opinion. Too many new types too soon. 737 Classics and 767s would have been a sound start to build on the knowledge of existing engineers. Let’s check again in five years.

the way forward are not to start any war, and fast reduce activities in conflicts around the world 😉 that will significant reduce costs i for USAF

Much of the costs of those operations are funded from the Overseas Contingency Operations budget, on which the USAF draws to fund specific exceptional costs that they would not have incurred otherwise.

For example, we find USAF procurement ledger entries such as:

plus one production aircraft procured with FY11 Overseas Contingency Operations supplemental funds to replace the aircraft [CV-22] lost in Operation Enduring Freedom.

and

$50M FY11 OCO funds procured two previously leased Bombardier Global Express BD-700 aircraft to host Interim Gateway payload (aka Battlefield Airborne Communications Node [BACN]).

The OCO is established and funded separately from the defense budgets.

The fact that the USAF does not have money to fund something as critical as fast-jet training isn’t entirely the result of overseas operations…!

Katangan aircraft after fleeing to Angola

Found these whilst browsing New Rhodesia forum. Described as being Katangan aicraft which fled to Henrique de Carvalho:

T-6

Lodestar and T-6

Hmm what’s this one? Dove in background.
Edit: My Big Book of Aeroplanes says this is a Bölkow Bo-207! Didn’t know they operated these. Looks like it is still wearing the standard factory paint scheme as seen for example here..

Some info on the Bo-207 as a type:
“Four-seat development of the three-seat Klemm Kl 107C, originally known as the Kl 107D, with 180 HP O-360-A1A engine, modified wings, full-vision cockpit canopy and other changes. The prototype first flew in October 1960 and 90 had been built by 1964.”

This list of Air Katanga and AVIKAT states that three entered service in August 1962.

Cub

Just checked to see what the state of the HAL LUH programme is.

There was a spat with Turbomeca last year about the transmission for the Shakti engine in the single-engined LUH; looks like HAL has gone its own route to design a new box but with “imported technology”. Seems a model of it ( or an actual example ) was displayed at Aero India 2013 last week.

Payload is to be 500 kg over 350 km, ceiling 6,500 metres. Not clear if that payload is to be lifted at that altitude, if so then it’s quite impressive. The re-engined Chetan ( SA.316B with TM333 ) can lift just 60 kg in those conditions!

Edit: no, the LUH payload is as rated at sea-level. Where the Chetan can lift a theoretical 840 kg…

Atlantique 2 in operation.

Thanks Mildave, so there are at least three deployed.

From that video here’s the schematic of the ATL2’s previously discussed wing hardpoints, empty on this surveillance flight.

Four-colour Bic biros seem popular onboard…

And is that one of the RAF’s Sentinels circled on the apron in the second pic?